“Stop Punishing Gay Nigerians” – Jos Archbishop Ignatius Kaigama Tells FG

                                     

The Catholic Archbishop of Jos, Ignatius Kaigama has said Nigerian government is “wrong” for “punishing” gay Nigerians. 

Speaking at a press briefing with The Tablet at the Vatican yesterday, the Archbishop stressed that the Catholic Church in Nigeria is opposed to any discrimination of gay people. 

According to him, after Nigeria adopted a law that hands out 14-year sentences to gay Nigerians earlier this year, he had announced the Church’s support for the legislation. 

However, there was a‘gross misinterpretation” of this by the media.

The Catholic Church, he now says, only supported the elements of the law that set out that marriage is between a man and a woman but is against “the criminalization of people with different sexual orientations”. He told The Tablet: 

“We are not supporting the criminalisation of people with different sexual orientations. We would defend any person with homosexual orientation who is being harassed, who is being imprisoned, who is being punished. The Government may want to punish them – we don’t. In fact we will tell the Government to stop punishing those with different orientations.”